The Moral Labor of Rwanda’s Post-Genocide Educators

• In Event: Global and Transnational Sociology Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): 4. Politics, Narratives, and Experiences

Abstract

In the aftermath of mass atrocity, states must determine how to educate younger generations about past violence, often treating schooling as a tool of social engineering to promote legitimacy and stability. While scholarship on post-conflict education has largely focused on curricular reform, it frequently overlooks the educators tasked with implementing these reforms—particularly those who personally experienced the violence. Drawing upon 30 interviews with Rwandan educators and participant observation of classrooms, we examine how Rwandan teachers who lived through the 1990–1994 civil war and the 1994 genocide teach about these events to subsequent generations. Having witnessed both the atrocities and the education system’s role in facilitating genocidal violence, many Rwandan educators express a strong commitment to peacebuilding, frequently invoking the mantra “Never Again.” We argue that these educators are best understood as moral laborers. Influenced by a broader human rights ideology and standardized memorialization practices—what David terms “moral remembrance”—teachers embrace a duty to remember, to face the past, and to pursue justice for victims. They do not passively transmit state curricula; rather, many actively participate in the state’s social engineering project through emotionally and ideologically embedded labor. We identify two primary forms of moral labor. First, teachers prioritize prevention-oriented narratives, emphasizing proof that genocide occurred and combating denial, often simplifying complex historical causes to foreground the dangers of division and violence. Second, they perform neutrality to bolster students’ trust, though in some cases this entails feigned ideological alignment with the government’s official history.

Authors

• Jillian LaBranche, Princeton University

• David Mwambari, KU Leuven